Bird Life in the Spanish Marismas 



295 



alon^' 



in hulk, and would have heen a tremendous load for an Kno-Hsh 

 road. 



Hut how can I describe the track al()nt>' which we journeyed 

 for four or five 

 hours { ^Vctual 

 road there was 

 none, but a barely 

 visible track 

 wandered 

 through pine- 

 forests and thick 

 prickly scrub, 

 skirting round im- 

 penetrable thickets 

 and morasses of 

 unknown depth. 

 Often the heather 

 came over our 

 heads ; sometimes 

 we ploughed along 

 painfully over an 

 endless succession 

 of sand-dunes, 



t h r O U o- h W hose Nigh t-heron {NycHcoi-ax griseiis). 



loose surface our animals sank fetlock-deep. Many miles of 

 the way were through thick and most tenacious mud, whose 

 surface was not yet dried into the l)rick-like hardness of those 

 parts from which the water had earlier receded. There the 



